The first launch from pad 39A since the shuttle Atlantis lifted off in July 2011 was a psychological boost for the space center eager to show it had evolved into more than just a NASA spaceport. Craig Bailey, Florida Today via USA TODAY NETWORK

Minutes later, the rocketÕs first stage did something the historic missions never contemplated, flipping around above the atmosphere and flying back to Cape Canaveral for a soft landing that unleashed powerful sonic booms across the area. Craig Bailey, Florida Today via USA TODAY NETWORK

Students from Bearden Middle School traveled to Cape Canaveral over the weekend to see their student-designed experiments launched into space.

Knox County Schools students have participated in the National Center for Earth and Space Science Education's Student Spaceflight Experiments Program since 2012. This year's "Mission 9" space flight is Knox County's third space flight.

The most recent launch came after an explosion in 2014, and a delay of the most recent launch over this past weekend.

On Saturday, SpaceX scrubbed a launch attempt from a historic Kennedy Space Center pad due to technical issues.

"There was this sense of disappointment because it had happened before and had gone wrong before," Kayla Canario, an instructional coach at Bearden Middle, said.

SpaceX had hoped to launch a Falcon 9 rocket and cargo craft from the same Kennedy Space Center pad that sent men to the moon nearly 50 years ago.

The unmanned launch of International Space Station supplies that happened on Sunday opened a new commercial chapter at the historic NASA launch site that last hosted a mission 5½ years ago, when NASA launched Atlantis on the final flight of the shuttle program.

Bearden students, who were traveling back to Knoxville on Monday, are expected to participate in a news conference Wednesday at the middle school to discuss the launch, their projects and their experience over the weekend.

A team of nine students from Bearden, plus one from West High School, won a place on Mission 9 with a microgravity experiment to test a treatment for conjunctivitis in space.

Canario said that she's happy to see the students get pumped for their project, but especially the girls.

"It's been a passion of mine to get girls to get excited about science," Canario said.

More than 13,000 students from 21 school districts in the United States and Canada competed for a spot on the Mission 9 flight, submitting nearly 3,000 proposals overall.

After the students finished their proposal to test antibiotics on pinkeye bacteria, they worked through the technical parts of their experiment with a microbiology assistant research professor at the University of Tennessee.

"We’re really taking a look at the effect that microgravity has as compared to normal gravity," Canario said.

Results are expected back in four to six weeks.

"They’ll send it back down in a capsule and it will land somewhere, where it will be sent directly to us," Canario said.